Geneva, 5 September 2016
Dear Colleagues,
The ETH161 Appeal has been both extended (for 5 additional months) and revised, for the following reasons: late receipt of funds, underfunding of some components and challenges and delays in implementation, including massive coordination effort and heavy bureaucratic process to get permission to respond to particular geographic area, which didn’t stop requesting members to prioritize the limited resource received and take action to respond.
The current food insecurity crisis/drought in Ethiopia appear to be the result of a combination of factors that includes the pre El Nino failure of the spring rains and the El Nino induced late onset, erratic and early cessation of the main summer rains.
According to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA), more than 10 million people in Ethiopia are at risk of hunger following the worst drought in 30 years. The Ethiopian Government says more than 400 rural districts (Woredas) are affected and 10.2 million people, including nearly 6 million children (among which 0.4 million severely acute malnourished and 1.7 million moderately acute malnourished), will require urgent food assistance programmes among other interventions in January 2016 due to drought. It was also reported that the drought caused the death of over 400 thousand livestock and displacement of 0.8 million people. It is estimated that the country will need 1.4 billion USD to respond to the emergency.
The major humanitarian needs include: to protect the lives of millions of people who are at risk due to lack of food, water and disease outbreaks. To support their livelihoods as they lost significant part of their livestock and the remaining animals are in very poor condition. Also, as the affected people consumed their seeds, these need to be replenished to ensure adequate planting for the next agriculture season.
Also agricultural inputs are needed to ensure good harvesting for the coming year. Flooding and other drought or conflict-related displacement will lead to more humanitarian needs such as shelter and non-food items.
The ACT Forum in Ethiopia is supporting ongoing response efforts by population affected by drought through food assistance, early recovery and restoration of livelihoods, health and nutrition support, agricultural and livestock production and WASH. Around 25% of the total targeted population said to be in need of physical and psychosocial support (see 2016 HRD) which LWF Ethiopia intend to address through mainstreaming of CBPS aspects.